Pinarayi Vijayan, who will swear in as a Chief Minister of Kerala for the second time on Thursday (May 20), has formed his cabinet with 21 ministers. His prime focus was on newcomers despite the old guards handled the pandemic exceptionally well. The state health minister in the Left Democratic Front -1 (LDF-1), KK Shailaja, who was bestowed for slaying Covid in the first wave which hit in 2020, was dropped from the new cabinet and will don the new avatar as a party whip.
Besides Shailaja Teacher, all the other sitting ministers were dropped from the cabinet. The party has selected MB Rajesh as the Speaker candidate. TP Ramakrishnan has also been appointed as the Parliamentary Party Secretary.
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"CPI(M) state committee appoints Pinarayi Vijayan as parliamentary party leader & CM. Ministers are MV Govindan, K Radhakrishnan, KN Balagopal, P Rajeev, VN Vasavan, Saji Cherian, V Sivankutty, Mohd Riyas, Dr R Bindu, Veena George & V Abdul Rahman," reads a statement from CPI(M) committee.
Earlier, the LDF had announced that 12 CPI(M) MLAs will remain as state cabinet ministers but it comes as a shocker when all the sitting ministers are dropped.